Banksia

A few years ago, we returned to Britain from France by car after a two week holiday. The occupants of the car were three British passport holders and me, with an unexpired "Leave to Remain" stamp in my Australian passport. The EU line had cars, the British line was empty, so my British passport holding driver went to the British gate.

As soon as the immigration officer saw the car was "tainted" by the presence of a non-citizen, he set off an alarm and rudely ordered the whole car load to the back of the EU queue. Welcome to Britain! My UK relatives were appalled and embarrassed at our treatment. It was a sad display of British "authority".

tonrob

Was this off the ferry? How long ago? I used travel Calais - Dover quite a lot between 2000 and 2004, but never recall seeing a 'British' queue. I've never done the Eurotunnel shuttle though.

Dan725

We always go through the foreign line at Gatwick....it is usually shorter, anyway Last two times I have just entered on my US passport too....always fun to have a laugh and joke about that with the person on the desk.

Xebedee

Bunch of amateurs.

We cast off when the moon is clouded and row towards the nearest cove. After stashing most of the merchandise in a cave 15 paces due North of the bones of Ol' Spigot (the one legged hunchback hermaphrodite Cap'n of the Spotted Bunghole), we make our way up the cliffs to the "Groggy Implant Tavern" and via the stable doors out where "Young Dick" met his nemesis "Spindly Goatcheese" and yet lived to tell the tale (tho only for a few rather painful minutes as Doc Rustyknobbe removed Spindly's equipment from Dick's left ear).

Once inside, we feel our way way thru the smoke, phlegm and manure of highwaymen, brigands and accountant-mimes (which isn't easy when you are lugging 4 crates of "Old Pigsmooch" in your underwear) and pay the barkeep (ask for "Damned Trevor" or if he's not there; get the attention of Nigel - he's the foul smelling one with a spare foot under his hat) for a room to stay low for the night.
I suggest the cellar if there is no-one else there as it has a nice street-level view of the abattoir down by "Felch Lane" - you know the one next to where "Pete-the-knee" had his last one removed in a duel with the younger Squire Crappload after pissing too close to Mistress Gnomethrottler's laundry line one Whitsun's eve.

Oh, this could just go on for days.........anyway - its a lot more fun this way.

Anian

My USC wife and I always go through together on the line for citizens of that country, never had any issues. We used to separate to our respective lines until they official told us we didn't need to. Just means we get to wait in baggage claim together though.

jon_nyc

I asked if we could all go through UK/EU line with USC wife at Heathrow about 5 years ago and they said yes, so always do it that way together and have never had a problem.

deng890

I went through Heathrow Terminal 3 last year with my US Citizen girlfriend (I am a UK Citizen). I assumed she'd have to go through non-EU and I'd have to wait for her on the other side.
However, when we were about to split up an immigration officer came up to us, asked if we were travelling together and said "groups stay together" and directed us to the UK/EU line. We had no problems going through (I was even using an expired UK passport!) and it took about 2 minutes to get through. Thank god, considering the non-EU line that day was totally backed up!

But judging by some of the previous postings, it appears as if the rules aren't consistent. Best just to ask the officers wandering around.


On a side note, we took a trip to Amsterdam via Ryan Air out of Stansted which was an absolute nightmare! We had no bags to check, but because my gf is not an EU citizen we had to line up in the massive "bag check" line for an hour just so that she could get a Ryan Air "checked for visas" stamp on her passport. The security personnel steadfastly refused to let her pass without that stupid stamp. Be warned- if you travel to the continent, then your partner's non-EU hassles will become your hassles!

Marocco

My USC wife and I always go through the EU/EEA/Swiss route together. We've never had a problem.

chopper40

I once traveled to Dublin from UK with my USC spouse on a Ryan air flight. We were there for a weekend city break. She got interrogated pretty harshly with the immigration officer. I was stood right there with her and he asked "what is your purpose here" "Do you intend to stay here?" etc etc. Then he wrote "3 days " on the stamp in the passport. It was quite traumatic at the time. Now we look at his little "3 day" scribble and laugh.Like we would ever think about defecting and over-staying in Ireland?!? There is no point giving these people attitude at the time, just let them do there little Hitler routine, then be done with them from your life..

deng890

Chopper, I have a similar story to yours, it involved our return trip from Amsterdam. We were only gone from the UK for 1 night. We arrive back in Stansted late the following evening and proceed to immigration. We tried to go through the EU line like we did in Heathrow, but they quickly scolded us for trying that and made both of us go through the Non-EU line.

So there we were in the non-EU line at midnight in a deserted Stansted Airport. We had the unfortunate luck of getting some nasty little officer who was clearly new to the job and decided to throw every regulation he possibly could at us. I showed him my girlfriend's US passport and my UK one, and he asked to see her return ticket to the US. When we informed him that we didn't have a copy he told us we were in violation of regulation blah blah (never mind that the guys at Heathrow never ask for this!) and started quizzing us intently as to our purpose in the UK, how long we had been there, and then I almost totally lost my cool when he asked to see my US passport (as a UK citizen he had NO business asking for that!) He then graciously "let us off" and be on our way with a warning. Total w@nker! If it wasn't for the fact that he could've given my girlfriend infinite grief then I would've quite literally thrown the book right back into his face.

Totally opened up my eyes to what non-EU citizens can go through with some of these UK immigration jobsworths, even your average American tourist. I can only imagine what those from developing nations go through!

pTeronaut

I'm going to update this thread with our recent experience and observations based on the current situation concerning the supposed unauthorized relaxation of non-EU citizen vetting.

We arrived at Heathrow early Saturday 15th October via a United Airlines flight, to find that the Non-EU line was only staffed by one agent. I accompanied my USC wife throught that line and presented both my UK & her US passports to the agent who placed them behind the counter and within one minute handed them back to us and sent us on our way.

Was the agent supposed to have fingerprinted the missus as the news is saying should have happened?

Egon

I think (though someone may correct me) the finger printing was meant to be done on people from nations that need a visa to visit the UK (even as a tourist) so as a US citizen your wife would not have been finger printed anyway - my wife never has been when we've visited.

Also, this might be a bit late but my experience of coming through Heathrow with her is that the first time I approached someone and asked if she could come through with me in the UK/EU line and we were told yes. That went smoothly and so each time after that we've just gone straight to the UK/EU line and never had an issue.